Signed Landmarks
Signed Landmarks is a BBC Schools TV series from the 1990s & 2000s, covering geography for primary school pupils.
Two units of the BBC schools TV series Landmarks were transformed into British Sign Language versions in the 1990s for deaf and hard-of-hearing pupils.
The original Landmarks programmes did not just have a sign language interpreter in the corner of the screen, but were significantly expanded with new presenters talking about the topics using sign language as well.
The 1995 Portrait of Britain unit was expanded from 5 to 10 episodes for this signed version, drawing on other geography programmes and including a repeated episode of the signed BBC series See Hear for deaf viewers. The signed version of Portrait of Britain was spread over 2, two-hour overnight broadcasts, and only shown during the 1997-98 school year.
The 1998 Landmarks unit on The Caribbean was transformed into a signed version soon after its original transmission. The original five episodes were used, but expanded from 20 to 25 minutes with additional signed material added.
The five 25-minute episodes of the signed version of The Caribbean were too long to fit into a typical two-hour timeslot on the overnight BBC2 Learning Zone broadcasts, so the first 4 were shown together in a two-hour slot, with the fifth shown separately. Originally in 1998 the 5th Caribbean episode was paired with five of the signed Portrait of Britain episodes to make up a two-hour slot. For later repeats from 2002 it was instead paired with episodes of Hands Up! and Moving to English.
Episode List
| # | # | Title | Broadcast |
|---|---|---|---|
| Portrait of Britain | |||
| 1. | (1) | Skye: A Scottish Island | 14 Oct 1997 |
| 2. | (2) | The Bridge to Skye | 14 Oct 1997 |
| 3. | (3) | Stoke: An Industrial City | 14 Oct 1997 |
| 4. | (4) | Peterborough: A New Town | 14 Oct 1997 |
| 5. | (5) | Getting from Place to Place | 14 Oct 1997 |
| 6. | (6) | Village, Town and City | 15 Oct 1997 |
| 7. | (7) | London: A Capital City | 15 Oct 1997 |
| 8. | (8) | The River Severn | 15 Oct 1997 |
| 9. | (9) | Folkestone: Gateway to Europe | 15 Oct 1997 |
| - | (10) | See Hear Special: Paris | 15 Oct 1997* |
| The Caribbean | |||
| 10. | (1) | Landscape | 26 May 1998 |
| 11. | (2) | People | 26 May 1998 |
| 12. | (3) | Work | 26 May 1998 |
| 13. | (4) | Climate | 26 May 1998 |
| 14. | (5) | Buildings | 27 May 1998 |
* - the Portrait of Britain unit was complemented by an episode of the BBC magazine programme See Hear, originally broadcast for a general audience on 26th February 1995.
Broadcasts
| Year | Term | Sat | Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Channel | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1997-98 | Autumn 1997 | Tuesday, 2:00am | Wednesday, 2:00am | BBC2 | 14 & 15 Oct, Portrait of Britain | |||||
| Summer 1998 | Tuesday, 2:00am | Wednesday, 2:00am | BBC2 | 26 & 27 May, The Caribbean & Portrait of Britain | ||||||
| 1998-99 | - | |||||||||
| 1999-2000 | - | |||||||||
| 2000-01 | - | |||||||||
| 2001-02 | Summer 2002 | Saturday, 2:00am | Sunday, 2:00am | BBC2 | 14 Jul, 25 & 31 Aug, The Caribbean | |||||
| 2002-03 | Autumn 2002 | Monday, 2:00am | BBC2 | 4 Nov, just ep 5 of The Caribbean | ||||||
| Summer 2003 | Saturday, 2:00am | BBC2 | 16 Jun, The Caribbean | |||||||
CBBC Channel
Also broadcast on the CBBC Channel 'Class TV' service of schools programmes to mark Deaf Awareness Week (this list may be incomplete):
- 2002-03: Summer 2003 (Tuesday 6 May 2003 from 10:30am)
- 2003-04: Autumn 2003 (from Monday 13 October 2003, 11:30am) & Summer 2004 (Tuesday 4 May 2004 at 10:30am)
- 2004-05: Autumn 2004 (from Monday 20 September 2004, 11:30am) & Summer 2005 (Tuesday 3 May 2005 at 10:30am)
Credits
| The Caribbean | |
| Presenters | Barbara Burke |
| Sign Language Interpreter | Hetty May Bailey |
| Voice Over | Audrey Simmons |
| Sign Language Consultant | Tessa Padden |
| Education Officers | Steven Fawkes |
| Executive Producer | Clare Elstow |
| Series Producer | Kerena Marchant |
Resources
Video
The unit on The Caribbean was released to schools on video tape. The video continued to be advertised for sale until at least 2007, long after transmissions had finished.
Related programmes
- Landmarks: Portrait of Britain
- Landmarks: The CaribbeanOriginal versions of these units, in English with no sign language.
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